Computing devices are often used to access and display business data located on computers. Examples of business data include information about a product sale, information about a business meeting, an organization, or a person. Business data relating to the same entity or event may be stored on multiple computers, including computer systems, such as an enterprise application computing system, a desktop general-purpose computer, a laptop general-purpose computer, and computing devices, such as a personal digital assistant (PDA). In some cases, this business data related to the same event or entity and stored on multiple computer systems and computing devices may be structured and arranged in the same manner. In other cases, this business data may be structured and arranged differently for display on, and use by, different types of computer systems and computing devices.
For example, when a sales invoice for a particular sale is displayed and used on a desktop computer system accessing an enterprise application that includes the sales invoice, all of the information for the sales invoice may be displayed. Similarly, when the sales invoice is displayed on a laptop computer accessing business data stored on the laptop computer, all of the information for the sales invoice may be displayed. However, when the sales invoice is displayed on a PDA or other type of device with a limited display capacity, storage capacity, or processing capacity, the information displayed for the sales invoice may be reduced, or substantially reduced, than when information for the sales invoice is displayed using a laptop computer or desktop computer.
A reference address, such as a uniform resource locator (URL), can be used to identify a particular collection of business data related to a particular event or a particular entity that is located on a particular computer system or a particular computing device. When collections of business data relate to the same event or entity and are located on multiple computer systems and computing devices, many reference addresses may be used to identify business data that relate to the same event or entity. For example, a reference address may be used to identify a particular sales order stored on a customer-relationship management server, and a different reference address may be used to identify the same sales order stored on a mobile device. When business data may be stored on many different types of computer systems and computing devices, many different reference addresses may be used to identify the business data.
Some of the reference addresses may not be usable by some types of computer systems or computing devices. For example, a reference address that identifies business data stored on a laptop computer may only be accessible to the laptop computer itself. In another example, data stored on an enterprise application computer system that is structured and arranged for display on a general-purpose computer, such as a desktop computer or laptop computer, may not be usable or able to be displayed on a PDA. This may be due, for example, to the difference in processing, storage, and display capabilities in the computing environments between the general-purpose computer and the PDA.
In some cases, one (or some) of the reference addresses may be preferable for accessing business data from a particular type of computing environment. For example, an end user using a laptop computer may prefer to access business data that is stored locally on the laptop computer rather than business data stored on an enterprise application server that is accessible using a network connection to the laptop computer. This may be, for example, because accessing the locally stored data may be faster.
To access the business data stored in multiple computer systems, one of the many possible reference addresses must be selected. Often this may be accomplished by presenting to the end user a list of the reference addresses that may be used to access the business data and asking the end user to make a selection from the list of possible reference addresses. In such cases, the end user needs to be able to differentiate the reference addresses presented for selection so that the end user may select the most appropriate, or otherwise preferred, reference address from the list of possible reference addresses. One reference address may be more appropriate than other reference addresses, for example, based on the computing capabilities of computing device (e.g., screen display capabilities, processing capability, and storage capacity), the type of software available on the computing device, and the type of access used to access the business data (e.g., remote versus local access to business data stored). These characteristics may be referred to as the computing environment.
A reference address also can be used to identify a computer program that is located on a particular computer system or a particular computing device. In some cases, a reference address may be used to identify a method that structures and arranges business data for display on and use by a particular type of computer system or computing device. A different reference address may be used to identify another method that structures and arranges the same business data for display on and use by a different type of computer system or computing device. To access the business data so that the business data is structured and arranged for a particular type of computer system or computing device, one of the possible reference addresses must be selected.